by Megan Mulry
“What am I to do?” she said on a moan, leaning her head back against the sofa cushion and looking at the angels across the ceiling. “I’ve only spent thirty minutes in her presence and already my mother’s driving me berserk. She willfully misconstrues everything I say or do.”
Trevor reached for one of her hands and took it between both of his, massaging her knuckles and wrist. “Stop worrying. You’ll be back in Cairo in no time. Anonymous and living your Bedouin existence.”
“Is that so wrong?” She shut her eyes and relaxed into his firm touch. “When you say it, I feel happy and free. When she says it . . . I feel as if I’m being irresponsible and running away. Why does she make me feel so wrong all the time?”
“Maybe you make her feel wrong, did you ever think of it that way?” Trevor was always trying to see every side. “Maybe her idea of being a good mother means her children are always near.”
She opened her eyes to look at him. He was so damnably perfect: the kind blue eyes, never judgmental; the slight lift of his full mouth, always sympathetic, never sardonic. “Oh, Trevor. You must be understanding like that for all of us—I couldn’t possibly manage it.” She turned to James. “How can you bear it? All his kindness? It almost makes it worse. Now I feel heartless around my mother and heartless around Trevor for not being more understanding of my own heartlessness.”
“Come, Georgie. It can’t be as bad as all that. Vanessa is so loving.” James abandoned his work and joined them on the sofa. He was watching the way Trevor’s hands worked on hers, probably thinking the massage was wasted on her.
“I know!” Georgie exclaimed. “That’s why it’s so dispiriting. She’s so kind and open and generous and perfect, and then she looks at me and I can practically feel the disappointment roll off her in waves. Because I’m none of those things. I’m selfish and closed off and—”
“Oh, do stop it. That’s simply not true.” Trevor finished squeezing her pinkie, then rested her hand back on her thigh. “You are always helping others, even if you are not effusive about it. Look what you’re willing to do for me.”
Georgie waved her hand in front of her face. “Oh, that’s nothing.”
“Marrying me is nothing?” Trevor laughed and shook his head. “Saving this estate by fulfilling the outrageous demands of my father’s entail that I marry a woman. Emphasis his.”
“Well.” Georgie smiled at the way he said it. “When you put it that way, I see what you mean. But you know, even that, Vanessa is going to be appalled—tormented that it’s not a love match. Because it’s obvious I’m not in love with you or any such foolishness.”
She caught the glance that James and Trevor exchanged. “I mean, it would be foolish for me. I mean . . . See, when you two look at each other like that, that is love. Of course I love you as my dearest friends—I can tell you anything, say anything, do anything. But really? All that gooey emotion is just . . .” She shivered at the thought. “So cloying.”
Both men laughed, and then James stood up to pour them all drinks. With his back still turned, he asked, “If you’re really able to tell us anything, Georgie, have you ever . . . you know . . . been with anyone?”
Georgie smiled at his back and then looked at Trevor to see what he thought, if it was just a silly question. But his lips were quirked and he seemed genuinely interested.
“Fine,” he admitted, “I’ve also wondered.”
“Really?”
He shrugged adorably. “I mean, I haven’t spent a lot of time thinking about it. But you know, you’re fabulous and my closest friend and you deserve to have a bit of fun like the rest of us.”
“I’m so flattered you two have taken an interest in my physical needs.”
“Oh, never mind.” James obviously sensed her sarcasm. He crossed the room and handed them each a glass of whiskey. “I shouldn’t be so crass, but I always think of you as one of the boys, so I figured I might as well ask what I’d feel comfortable asking . . . one of the boys.”
Georgie loved that idea. Why shouldn’t she tell them about her rather blasé attitude toward her sexual activities? It was nothing more than a physical appetite she satisfied when the need arose, akin to eating or drinking. “Well, when you put it that way, as long as I’m one of the boys and all, I’ll tell you.”
“Ooh, exotic stories from faraway lands!” Trevor settled more comfortably into his corner of the sofa.
“Well, I was in Egypt first. Lots of British expatriates and French soldiers and a lot of mayhem actually. I’ll tell you more about it, of course. But to get to the point, once you went behind the veil—pulled back the curtain, what have you—Egypt and Arabia were quite fantastic places as far as the sex was concerned.”
James perked up. “Really?”
“Yes. Well, in some ways it was all very physical and matter-of-fact. When I was first there, for example, I met a slightly older British woman—a widow I think, but maybe an adventuress traveling under the guise of widowhood—who took me to a bathhouse, for women only of course. And oh, how the women take care of one another’s bodies, so tender and thorough. In an almost reverential fashion, they take hot baths, massage each other with splendid oils and fragrant extracts, and all that sort of thing, quite relaxing and luxurious. And trust me, there was nothing platonic about it. But I’m not really one for all that lounging, as you can imagine.” James and Trevor both smiled knowingly at the preposterous idea of Georgie sitting still for longer than a few moments at a time. “So, after I had set up my own establishment, well, I guess you could say I pursued my own desires.” Georgie sighed at the memories.
“Really?” Trevor teased. “So you were quite the belle of the . . . Bedouins?”
“Well, beau was more like it. All those men loved to treat me like their little British lad, to be played with, and used, you know, in all the ways men play with lads.”
“What?” Trevor nearly spat out his drink. “I beg your pardon?”
James’s eyes gleamed with anticipation. “Pray tell!”
“Well, I mean, you certainly didn’t think I was allowed to attend the horse breeding establishments and sales, or visit the inner sanctums of the sheikhs while I was the upstanding Lady Georgiana Cambury, did you?” She leapt up from the sofa and struck a mannish pose, one trousered leg cast arrogantly in front of the other. “George Camden at your service.” With that, she sketched a perfectly masculine bow.
James bellowed out a laugh. “You passed yourself off as a chap? I adore you!”
She nodded and smiled and stood up a little straighter, feeling immediately comfortable in the confident, manly position. “Of course it was awkward at first. I felt so . . . oh, I don’t know, like an impostor I suppose. But when I gave myself over to it, really let it wash over me, it was quite wonderful. It was perhaps the most comfortable I’ve ever felt in my own skin. Not only for the places I could finally go without raising the eyes of the matrons in the British social clubs in Cairo, but the actual feeling of it, of walking with my arms swinging and my legs strong. Keeping my chin up and looking out at the world instead of that mincing female business of always avoiding eye contact and staring at my feet.”
Trevor was still smiling from the joy of the revelation, but he obviously had other questions bubbling to the surface.
“What else?” Georgie wanted to take all comers.
“Well, you were never a very mincing female to begin with, Georgie, so I don’t see how it was that much of a change.”
“Really, Lord Mayson?” She raised a haughty brow and spoke in her deeper masculine tone. “You don’t think it would be that much of a change for you to put on a dress and walk down Bond Street? You don’t think you would feel powerfully aware of how people looked at you, how confining and distracting all the fabric and petticoats and delicate shoes would feel against your skin?”
He flushed. “Well when you put it that way, I’m powerfully interested.”
“Oh, you are terrible!” Georgie collapsed back onto th
e couch between them, all three taking sips of their drinks and sighing happily.
“He would, you know,” James remarked.
“Would what?” Georgie asked, still flushed from her confession.
“Walk down Bond Street dressed in the latest women’s fashions.” James leaned in front of Georgie and looked at Mayson. “Wouldn’t you, pet?”
Trevor smiled agreeably. “For you, darling, anything.”
“Stop it at once, you two, you’re far too affectionate. You know I can’t stand it.”
“Well, you’d best get used to it if we’re going to be married and all.” Trevor gave her a conspiratorial wink.
“I shan’t be a member of your household for long. After we say our vows and the terms of your father’s will are met, I’ll be off soon after.”
“Oh I know, but you’re still here for now, and I don’t like having to behave in front of you.”
“Is that what you’ve been doing for the past week since I arrived? Behaving?” Georgie asked.
“To be honest, yes.”
“Really? Well, far be it from me to tamp down your ardor. Feel free to do what you wish. I shan’t bat an eye.”
“Oh, how delicious! An audience!” James set his glass down on the Louis XIV table to the left of the sofa and stood up. “Move over, young Master Camden, I’ve some business to attend to with the lord of the manor.”
Georgie laughed and scooted to the far end of the sofa. “You’re terrible, James. As if you would do anything—” She gasped when James fisted his fingers into Trevor’s hair at the nape and tugged hard.
“Have you missed me, pet?” James’s voice had lowered to a menacing growl.
“Terribly,” Trevor panted.
With that, James rested one knee provocatively between Trevor’s spread thighs and dipped his mouth to Trevor’s, teasing him with the lightest kisses. At first, Georgie tried to look away, but the moans of pleasure were rather . . . inviting, and after a few vain attempts to appear disinterested, she curled her legs up beneath her and turned to watch the two men with her full attention.
James was a wicked, taunting beast. Giving Trevor little bits of suction here, a trail of his tongue there, a whisper of his lip along the edge of Trevor’s mouth, all the while tightening that mad grip at the base of the other man’s neck. Trevor’s entire huge body was coiled tight, broad shoulders and biceps flexing beneath the perfectly fitted velvet of his riding jacket, hands fisted into the blue silk upholstery of the couch.
“Why isn’t he touching you, James?” Georgie asked, as if watching two animals in the wild with a local guide there to answer her inquiries.
When James took his attention away—reluctantly—from Trevor’s moist, swollen lips, he turned to answer her. “Because he’s not allowed to touch me today.”
“Really? How divine.”
“It is. Quite,” James agreed. “He has to sit there patiently and take it. And it makes him quite exercised, doesn’t it, darling?” James pressed the palm of his free hand into the straining crotch of Trevor’s buckskins as he spoke casually to Georgie. “He gets delightfully frustrated, as you can see. Barely able to reply.”
Trevor moaned unintelligibly to prove the point.
Seeing this huge, capable man willfully—happily—reduced to this moaning, desperate pile of desire made something flip in Georgie’s belly. She stood up quickly and set her empty whiskey glass on the side table. “I’ll leave you to it, then.”
“You’re welcome to stay,” James called playfully after her, but she knew he didn’t really mean it.
“Three’s a crowd,” she responded over one shoulder, her voice echoing his levity. James laughed darkly and then she heard Trevor moan again.
Georgie pulled the door to the drawing room shut behind her, then leaned against it with a heavy sigh. She shut her eyes and let her heart race unfettered. She was such a liar.
In fact, it hadn’t been a crowd at all. For the first time in Georgie’s life, she had actually wanted to be an intimate part of something—and not merely physically intimate. Georgie had wanted to feel what James and Trevor were feeling, to give of herself the way they gave of themselves to one another.
And it terrified her.
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As with my previous historical romances, I was happily waylaid by lots of wonderful facts and fictions while researching and writing this story. As I began to look for inspiration, I was thrilled to learn more about Eleanor Butler and Sarah Ponsonby (the Ladies of Llangollen); Miss Anne Lister; and, as always, Vita Sackville-West. Quite recently, after I finished writing, I also happened upon Isabel Miller’s Patience and Sarah, which I highly recommend for its tender romance, frank humor, and gratifying happily ever after. I also recommend Jeanette Winterson’s Oranges are Not the Only Fruit, which, even though it takes place in the twentieth century, reads like a historical novel to me because of the strict, old-fashioned nature of the protagonist’s upbringing.
All of the above women—real or imagined—have in common a kind of relentless forward momentum that I tried to give to Vanessa and Nora. As Emma Donoghue said in her introduction to Patience and Sarah, “Historical fiction is often accused of nostalgia, but in this case it seems to have offered more of the visionary, fearless quality of science fiction.” I hope I have managed to create a world for Vanessa and Nora that has at least a hint of that “visionary, fearless quality.”
Lastly, a word about motherhood: I come from a very long line of strong-willed women—matriarchs, if you will. I think mothering is one of the most complicated, incomprehensible occupations, and I dedicate this story to all mothers and children who manage to navigate this profound relationship with grace and love.
Megan Mulry
January 27, 2015
I would like to offer special thanks to my editor, Delphine Dryden, who swooped in and transformed this story into something far richer and more nuanced than I had originally thought possible; to the rest of the team at Riptide, including Sarah Frantz Lyons, Rachel Haimowitz, and Alex Whitehall; to my reader/writer friends, Anne Calhoun, Miranda Neville, and Janet Webb, who listened to me rattle on about Vanessa-and-Nora-and-Anna-and-Georgie during countless meandering phone calls; and to L.C. Chase, who provided me with the lush historical romance cover of my dreams.
Regency Reimagined
Bound to Be a Bride
Bound to Be a Groom
Bound with Passion (coming soon)
Bound with Honor (coming soon)
Contemporary
A Royal Pain
If the Shoe Fits
In Love Again
R is for Rebel
Roulette
Historical
The Wallflowers
Megan Mulry writes sexy, stylish, romantic fiction. Her first book, A Royal Pain, was an NPR Best Bo
ok of 2012 and USA Today bestseller. Before discovering her passion for romance novels, she worked in magazine publishing and finance. After many years in New York, Boston, London, and Chicago, she now lives with her family in Florida.
Website: meganmulry.com
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